Disobedience Has a Deadline – Part Two
Consider again the case of Jerusalem and God’s discipline. Jerusalem was “Rebellious and polluted;” “thou oppressive city!” The city was in a sinful state of spiritual decadence. Through His prophet Zephaniah God identified four phases of their decadence and warned them of judgment if they did not repent and respond obediently. Of Jerusalem Zephaniah wrote using “She has not” four times: “Jerusalem, the wicked city. Woe to her who is rebellious and polluted . . .
-She has not obeyed His voice, (she heard it, but did not obey it).
-She has not received correction; (she received correction, that is, she interpreted it instead as undeserved discipline and hence rejected it).
-She has not trusted in the Lord, (she did not trust God, but rather man).
-She has not drawn near to her God (she did not repent and return to God).
Her princes in her midst are roaring lions; Her judges are evening wolves that leave not a bone till morning.” (Zephaniah 3:1-4). The brackets are my added description of what is meant by each of the four depictions of Jerusalem.
“Her princes” is a reference to the rulers. They were venal and greedy, corrupt.
“Her judges” are characterized as a wolf that devours its prey so completely there is not a bone left to be gnawed in the morning. They are “polluted,” referring to her inward moral filth, in spite of her outward ceremonial purity. This is descriptive of corrupt judges. America has just witnessed the corrupted trial of former President Trump. The judgment of guilt against him is important, but the prostituting of the court is even more grave. For our judicial systems to be politicized is to undermine the best judicial system in the world. Hundreds of legal authorities across America have used various terms to emphasize the aspects of misconduct by the judge who campaigned for election on the basis he would “Get Trump.” He thus considered Trump guilty before trial and risked his reputation to manipulate the legal system to gain a guilty verdict.
God warned them definitively to repent or be disciplined. They didn’t and God did. As always He followed His progressive steps: God warns. God waits. God keeps His word. Then came God’s wrath. He disciplined them using the sinful nation to discipline them. They overwhelmed Jerusalem and the people of their land and the Babylonians took them into exile.
There are numerous Bible examples of God disciplining nations. America should not expect to be exempted from God’s judgment as long our response to God’s grace period is negative.
One response of Jerusalem was to think God would “look the other way.” As a result they looked the other way away from God. Today it appears America feels God is a loving God and won’t deal harshly with it. They feel God is too good to punish people individually and/or collectively. Truly God is loving and longsuffering, but He is just, and thus must judge. What loving parent does not discipline his child. God is loving therefore He must judge. Don’t push God.